Live & Learn

Since 1995, the Ministry of Education has introduced various policies and programmes to improve the educational outcomes of Orang Asli Children. However, a paper titled ‘Education Policies in Overcoming Barriers Faced by Orang Asli Children’ written by Wan Ya Shin, highlights that children of the Orang Asli communities still tend to perform poorly and drop out of school.

The question is, why? We speak to Ya Shin to find out.

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The nation is collectively celebrating and beaming with joy, as news hit that teacher Samuel Isaiah has been named as one of the Top 10 finalists of the Global Teacher Prize 2020. The Global Teacher Prize, which is presented by the Varkey Foundation, comes with a US $1 million award, that is presented annually to an exceptional teacher who has made an outstanding contribution to their profession. Currently a Fulbright scholar pursuing a Master’s degree in Educational Policy and Leadership in State University of New York, Samuel joins us to share more about his work with Orang Asli children, and how he hopes to use this award to bring more attention to the issues they are facing, when it comes to their education.

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The buzzword of the week is "Emergency", following Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin's move to declare a state of emergency here in Malaysia, reportedly in response to the coronavirus crisis. Though the King has declared there is no need for an emergency to be declared under our current circumstances, we'd like to give you a 101 on what our Constitution says about the declaration of an emergency through Article 150, and helping us with that are lawyers Surendra Ananth and Lim Wei Jiet.

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Over the past couple of weeks, tens of thousands of Indonesians, led by students, have taken to the streets and protested against a new law that could potentially affect workers rights, as well as the environment. In some parts of the country, these protests have turned violent and many have been arrested.

On today’s episode of Live & Learn, Dashran has a chat with political analyst Eve Warburton -- who’s also the co-editor 'Democracy in Indonesia: from stagnation to regression’ -- on these important protests, the controversial Omnibus Law that started it all, as well as take a broader look at the political landscape of Indonesia and examine why many Indonesians have been growing increasingly dissatisfied with the political elite, over the past couple of years.

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In 2017, Malaysian musician, Pannir Selvam Pranthaman, was found guilty by the Singapore High Court, for trafficking 51.8g of diamorphine at the Woodlands Checkpoint in 2014. He was then sentenced to death. The 33-year-old, Pannir has been in prison ever since. In this episode, we speak with Angelia Pranthaman, who is Pannir’s sister, and Latheefa Koya, a human rights activist and an advisor at Lawyers For Liberty, to talk about Pannir’s journey so far, and also discuss if there’s a need for us to abolish the death penalty.

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A couple of kids are fighting at the playground. The dad watches, chuckles to himself and says “boys will be boys.” A man looks at his new female co-worker, shakes her hands and says “Welcome. And by the way, your behind looks really good in that outfit,” and then just walks away. The woman’s teammate tells her, “Get used to it. They mean no harm. Boys will be boys.” Boys will be boys. Boys will be boys. Boys will be boys. We’ve heard the phrase before. But is this something biological, something that’s inherently in us men or is this just a sorry and lame excuse? Is it simply toxic masculinity?

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According to the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), over 2 billion people do not have regular access to safe, nutritious and sufficient food, and nearly 690 million people are hungry - up 10 million from 2019. It's also expected that the COVID-19 pandemic could add between 83-132 million people to this number, depending on the economic growth scenario. Working in their own way to combat the double crisis of food wastage and hunger, is The Lost Food Project (TLFP), who have been rescuing surplus food from Malaysian supermarkets and placing it in the hands of those who need it most. In conjunction with World Food Day today, we speak to Mohd Syazwan bin Mokhtar, the General Manager of The Lost Food Project, about how they've responded to challenges brought on by the Covid-19 crisis, and also what needs to be done on a policy level, to combat inefficient food disposal.

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In September 2020, Saudi Arabia surprised many, when it opened its first dog-friendly cafe. This is of course in addition to other extraordinary societal changes that the country is seemingly going through, such as allowing women to drive, the opening of cinemas, WWE (yes, the pro-wrestling company) hosting mega shows in their country, and rap concerts!

The question is, do these changes mark a sharp shift in sociopolitics in the country OR is it just a facade? Is the country known for its high oil production and low human rights record becoming more progressive? We discuss with James Dorsey, Senior Fellow, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies & the Middle East Institute.

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Malaysia’s first audiobook platform, Nusantara Audiobooks launched in 2016, and began as a small initiative that aims to disseminate global knowledge to a local audience. As of now, the platform has more than 60 books and counting. We speak to Ady Faizal, Project Manager of Nusantara Audiobooks and Fikri Fisal, the Director of Nusantara Audiobooks, on the importance of audiobooks, their journey, as well as future plans.

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A recent report by UNICEF titled, ‘Our Lives Online: Use of Social Media by Children and Adolescents in East Asia’ states that two out of five children reported having bad experiences online they would not want to tell anyone about. The study also found that many young boys and girls are being sent and/or being asked to send explicit pictures. We discuss the findings of this report, and what we can do to better protect children online, with Datin Wong Poai Hong, honorary project director, Childline Foundation and Lim Yue Kin, Child Advocate, Childline Foundation.

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